What would four kids be like?

Everyone had a stroller today on the way to the park.


At the park today we met up with a mom Ximena and her 2 kids, Hannah and Daniel, whom we had met before at a birthday party. She needed to go pick up her husband Joe, so we offered to take care of the kids while she did - it turned into about an hour of great chaotic fun! We went back to our flat for grilled cheese dinners. We're hoping to spend more time with all of them.

Before and after...

Festival at the metro

Yesterday was another beautiful fall day here in Prague. Shanna and I are still recovering from some lingering colds, but we took it easy and managed to walk up to the nearby metro station. It's a big square called Namesti Miru, or "Square of Peace." There is a big festival this weekend called the New Wine Festival. They had a stage with musical groups, booths for food and wine, balloons, etc. It was a fun activity for all of us.
On the way we passed our new fountain, which had been under construction ever since we moved here.











Lucy got a purple balloon at the festival and got to ride on Daddy's shoulders on the way home.












Lucy also got to help Daddy with a home project - drilling a hole in the wall for a cable! It was fun.










And last night Lucy got to stay up late with the big people - we had a fun pizza party for lots of our friends who have been coming to Bible study. What a fun day!

"I speak Czech"

Lucy informed us today that she speaks Czech. We didn't know she knew that there was such a thing as the Czech language, or English for that matter. We asked her what Czech sounds like, to which she immediately replied, "Blah blah blah!" How funny, and how true! We couldn't help but agree with her.

Phil's language class ends on Friday - it couldn't come any sooner. It's been a good 3-week class, quite intense (hence, "Intensive Czech Class"), but my brain is full of lots of grammatical structures. It feels like "blah blah blah" to me too at times.

Joy, our favorite nanny, left this morning on her flight back to Charlotte - we really enjoyed our time with her. Here are some of the most recent pictures...

Lucy pushing "baby Joy"...

One of Lucy's new favorite activities is climbing trees...

Shanna with Emily and Ann-marie at Emily's baby shower.... Shanna and Joy...

Clark is still happy...

Clark-in-the-box

Tutu much

Lucy had her first dance class yesterday. She wore her pink tutu and new pink dance shoes. The class was in Czech, and even though it took her awhile to warm up to all the activity, she had so much fun - especially with her friends Eloise and Sophia, a friend from her pre-school.

Ready, Setty, Go!

In an effort to alleviate the stir-craziness that was infecting our household 2 days ago, we decided to let Lucy jump in puddles! We had a quick downpour that left lots of puddles around. She had a blast, as you can see.

We had to empty her boots with all the water that had collected in them. Before this, she knew that whenever we walked up to a puddle, she had to "make a good choice" and go around it. But not today - what freedom!

Party Time!

Eloise's Birthday Party!

Saturday we had the honor to attend Lucy's new friend Eloise's 2nd birthday party! We had so much fun. We had dinner and cake and ice cream. Eloise's parents, Emily and Jonathan are missionaries with Church of God. The Stones have been here the same amount of time we have. We so enjoy them and hope they will become very good friends of ours.

Hey everybody.....here I am!

Lucy, Clark and Shanna spent the morning in the garden.....

Language school

I (Phil) started Czech lessons on Monday. I'm doing a 3-week intensive course at a school called Akcent. It's every morning from 8:45 - 12:00, and with Joy here to help us out, the timing is working well. Here's a picture of the school:

It's been good so far - Czech is very similar to Russian, so I feel like I have a head start in many ways. My first successful "conversation" occurred yesterday on the way home from school. A lady approached me and started speaking in Czech - as I got ready to say my standard, "I don't understand, I don't speak Czech," I realized that I in fact understood she was asking me what time it was. I was very excited to pull out my cell phone and try to tell her - she looked for herself and said thank you before I could stammer out the time. But I said "goodbye," so I think that technically constitutes a conversation.

Bible study starts

We started our investigative Bible study on Thursday night at our place. We weren't sure exactly how many people would be there or where the conversation would go. It was exciting to see what happened - we had 11 folks show up and might have more in the future! We're going through Bible basics, or Systematic Theology 101, looking at the Gospel of John.

It felt like old times, in some ways - I had missed leading a Bible study group, but didn't realize how much until Thursday. And it was great to just hang out with other expats after it was over.

Summer Days

We had a great day at the pool! We met some friends... (yes you read this right we now have a few friends here..it is so exciting!) We met Eloise and Lydia and their mommies for a day of fun. This is the HArris Y of Prague and one of my favorite outdoor places to hang out.becuase it has an outdoor pool. It actually has three. One of them is Lucy and Clark size with a slide for them and then there is another slide that is huge and great fun for big people. Fun was had by all today... the girls played and enjoyed the water and the slide, while Clark enjoyed Miss Joy holding him in the pool while he splashed like a wild man and I enjoyed my new friendships in Emily and Ann-marie.

Sugar high!

Lucy was invited to a birthday party of one of her new friends, Viviana, who turned three last week. They celebrated by getting jacked up on sugar, which was a lot of fun at the time, but not as fun that night when Lucy wouldn't fall asleep. Oh well, immediate gratification is sure fun when it involves cake!

Clean-Up

After Bill's party we had some major clean-up to do! Clark was in full effect!

Party for Bill

Last night we had a fun party in honor of Bill, who's getting ready to leave for Budapest for his job. We will miss him terribly but had a great time last night eating Shanna's now-famous enchiladas, sharing Bill stories, and praying for him.

This was also our last chance to crown Bill the "King of Catan," playing our favorite game into the wee hours of the morning. One of the only good things about Bill leaving is that we'll be able to sleep more! Here we are at one of our final games - Bill is looking for his missing card - can you find it?

Bill "wake us up when you're finished" Lively, Jessica "Cirque du Soleil" Williamson, and Shanna "I refuse to trade with Bill" Davis

Our "car"

It takes a lot to get around town. Today was a big day because we went out with the kids TWO times. We really need a car, but we can't get one until we get our visas and residency permits. So we had Phil's parents bring over a huge box with a big stroller we ordered off eBay last month. It's awesome, and both Lucy and Clark can ride in/on it. Here the kids are today on their way to the post office to pick up a package from YaYa (Phil's mom).

We call it our "car." Here they are in front of the post office:

Our other big outing of the day was to the doctor, where both kids got check-ups and are doing great. Lucy's vision test was funny because they held up this sheet of pictures of various sizes to identify from across the room. She didn't like that, so when the doctor left, I picked up the other sheet of all the letters, just like you would see during a normal eye exam. She loved telling us what letters were on that sheet. The doctor came back in and started laughing.